AT AUGUSTA, MAINE
AUGUST 26, 1902
Governor Burleigh, my fellow-citizens, men and women of Maine:
It would be difficult for any man speaking to this
audience and from in front of the house in which
Elaine once lived to fail to feel whatever of Americanism there was
in him stirred to the depths. For my good fortune I knew Mr. Elaine
quite well when he was Secretary of State, and I have thought again
and again during the past few years how pleased
he would have been to see so many of the principles
for which he had stood approach fruition.
One secret, perhaps I might say the chief secret,
of Mr. Elaine s extraordinary hold upon the affections of his countrymen
was his entirely genuine and unaffected Americanism. When I speak of
Americanism I do not for a minute mean to say, gentle
men, that all the things we do are all right. I think
there are plenty of evils to correct and that often a
man shows himself all the more a good American
because he wants to cut out any evil of the body politic which may
interfere with our approaching the
ideal of true Americanism. But not only admitting
but also emphasizing this, it yet remains true that
throughout our history no one has been able to render really great
service to the country if he did not believe in the country.
Mr. Elaine possessed to an eminent degree the confident hope in the nation's
future which made him feel that she must ever strive
to fit herself for a great destiny. He felt that this
Republic must in every way take the lead in the
Western Hemisphere. He felt that this Republic
must play a great part among the nations of the
earth. The last four years have shown how true
that feeling of his was.
He had always hoped that we would have a peculiarly intimate relation
with the countries south of us. He could hardly have anticipated no one
could have the Spanish War and its effects. In
consequence of that war America s interest in the
tropic islands to our south and the seas and coasts
surrounding those islands is far greater than ever before.
Our interest in the Monroe Doctrine is more
complicated than ever before. The Monroe Doc
trine is simply a statement of our very firm belief
that on this continent the nations now existing here
must be left to work out their own destinies among
themselves and that the continent is not longer to be
regarded as colonizing ground for any European
power. The one power on the continent that can
make that doctrine effective is, of course, ourselves;
for in the world as it is, gentlemen, the nation which
advances a given doctrine likely to interfere in any
way with other nations must possess power to back
it up if she wishes the doctrine to be respected.
We stand firmly on the Monroe Doctrine.
The events of the last nine months have rendered it evident that
we shall soon embark on the work of excavating the Isthmian Canal
to connect the two great oceans a work destined to be, probably,
the greatest engineering feat of the twentieth
century, certainly a greater engineering feat than
has ever yet been successfully attempted among the
nations of mankind ; and as it is the biggest thing of
its kind to be done I am glad it is the United States
that is to do it. Whenever a nation undertakes to
carry out a great destiny it must make up its mind
that there will be work and worry, labor and risk,
in doing the work. It is with a nation as it is with
an individual ; if you are content to attempt but little
in private life you may be able to escape a good deal
of worry, but you won t achieve very much. The
man who attempts much must make up his mind that
there will now and then come days and nights of
worry; there will come even moments of seeming
defeat. But out of the difficulties we wrest success.
So it is with the nation. It is not the easy task that
is necessarily the best.
Source: The Works of Theodore Roosevelt Roosevelt, Memorial Edition